A truly great film works on multiple levels. With each viewing you notice newness within the frame that you had not seen before. This is not to say that great films need be complicated. Anomalisa itself is quite simple, but its beauty is in its simplicity. The latest film by Charlie Kaufman, with co-director Duke Johnson, is stop-motion animation using …

A western set in a snowy environment with eight murderous types of personalities could make for an interesting story. There’s bound to be violence and mayhem all over, but there has to be something else included to give it all the value it deserves. Unfortunately, this is where The Hateful Eight fails first. Sure, there’s violence and stuff, but there’s …

Beyond blatant social and political flubs, one of the worst offenses a film can commit is assuming its audience is made up entirely of idiots. Films that talk down to the audience, or over explain the plot, feel like having a conversation with a person who is certain they are smarter than you and want you to know it. They …

House party movies will never go away. From my generation’s Can’t Hardly Wait, to the millennials’ Project X, watching a house full of teens let loose their angst and indulge their hormones will always have an audience. What we rarely see is a reunion, as adults, throwing an equally epic house party. Old School hinted at the arrested development in …

I never include spoilers in my reviews anyway, so the request to not have them in this piece about Star Wars: The Force Awakens isn’t really causing me to alter my approach. The only thing I have to change is the I highlight the summary since that’s a part of what they don’t want spoiled. Then again, even if no …